UCLA libraries inspire movie-maker

  Saltzman Communications Director Eric
Schwab, a UCLA alumnus, works with actor Monet
Mazur on the set of "The Learning Curve."

By Suneal Kolluri
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

On average, students study at UCLA for a little more than four
years.

Eric Schwab, writer/director of the new movie “The
Learning Curve,” has studied here for over 20.

Decades after his graduation in 1981, Schwab still goes to UCLA
libraries whenever he needs to get some work done.

“I pretty much do all of my writing at the UCLA library.
If I do it at home or sit at home in my office, I might get two or
three pages done, but at the library I get like eight pages
done,” Schwab said in a phone interview.

Schwab, however, doesn’t only work on scripts in the UCLA
library; he also takes some time to observe.

“I look around sometimes, I usually try and keep to
myself, but sometimes I kind of observe, see what the newest trends
are, see how things have changed, what the conversations are and
stuff like that. Every now and then I’ll pick up stuff like
that.”

“The Learning Curve,” Schwab’s new movie,
opened last Friday and tells the story of Georgia (Monet Mazur) and
Paul (Carmine Giovinazzo), a young couple whose love for quick cash
gradually turns them into full-fledged con artists.

Their scams start off fairly harmless, but the two slowly get a
little too involved in the crime-filled Los Angeles underworld and
are eventually in too deep to pull themselves out.

While Georgia recognizes their downward spiral, Paul is both
unwilling and unable to escape his new life of deception.

Throughout the film, Schwab has his characters pull some wild
scams. One of those scams actually came from the writer’s own
experience.

“The film starts off with absolutely harmless scams and
then it gets a little more serious, and then real serious,”
Schwab said. “The very first thing the film starts with is a
guy sneaking into the movie trying to see a film for free. That
actually happened to me in the Avco theater in Westwood, and the
guy came around with his flashlight to kick us out of
there.”

Schwab grew up and went to school in the San Fernando Valley and
got a jump start on his film education there.

“I grew up in L.A., so the school I went to in the Valley
had some film equipment so I used to make films there,” he
said. “I went to school with Jon Lovitz so he was always the
actor in the films I did … I used to always find any excuse to
make a film for school.”

After high school, Schwab attended Berkeley for two years and
transferred to UCLA film school.

After graduating, he became a location manager and got the
chance to work closely with many big directors. Eventually his
duties brought him in touch with famous suspense director Brian
DePalma.

“I was actually a location manager on one of his films and
we just connected. Part of the reason is I had a good film
education from UCLA, and when he referred to other films, I knew
what he was talking about … and he really just taught
me.”

From then on, Schwab began to direct the second units on many of
Brian DePalma’s big budget films. The second unit is a
secondary crew that works along with the first unit to speed up
production of big budget films.

“Since I graduated from UCLA I’ve been directing big
second unit films. I’ve directed mostly on Brian DePalma
films,” he said. “I directed the first “˜Mission
Impossible,’ the second unit on that … but I always wanted
to do my own film.”

Schwab thus began writing some scripts in hopes that he would
get the chance to direct one of them. And after many attempts at
doing other scripts, “The Learning Curve” was the one
that worked for him.

“It just came together really easily for me,” he
said. “I’m really excited about it … I’m glad I
did this as a first one.”

He even got some help from his old friend DePalma.

“He helped me quite a bit on this one … he gave me the
best advice I got when I had the rough cut of it done. He had the
most brilliant idea and it worked beautifully … it was something
I never thought of and I thought “˜Man, that really looks
good.'”

Schwab is proud of his first feature film.

“There’s a couple parts I’m especially proud
of,” he said. “It kind of has a serious theme, but it
also has a sense of humor to it … what happens is the seriousness
of it creeps up at you … you don’t see it as a film
that’s preaching.”

And it all started at UCLA: where great scripts begin.

“It started off in the UCLA research library …
it’s a big leap to go from sitting at that library desk to
characters that people can kind of get into.”